HINDS AND THEIR CALVES. 89 



does not seem to like exposing himself more than is necessary 

 to extremes of heat and cold. In this respect the hinds seem 

 more hardy than their antlered lords. For some time after 

 they lose their horns in the beginning of May the stags seem 

 to feel helpless and unarmed, retiring to out-of-the-way 

 places, where they remain as quiet and stationary as they . 

 can, not wandering far from their hiding-place, till their horns 

 having in some measure grown, they feel more able to keep 

 their place amongst their fellows. I have often heard people 

 affirm that they hide their horns invariably on casting them, 

 but this is by no means the case ; the horns are constantly 

 found ; I have frequently picked them up myself, and have 

 seen great numbers that have been found on the hills. A 

 man walking across a rugged and extensive range of moun- 

 tain cannot expect to find very often an object so little con- 

 spicuous as a stag's horn, unless he is a forester or keeper, 

 and as such living amongst the deer at all times. There is no 

 doubt, too, that deer have the habit of chewing and breaking 

 up horns or bones, or any substance of the kind, that they 

 find in their wanderings ; in the same manner that cattle in 

 a field will chew for hours together a bone, old bit of leather, 

 or any other hard substance, to the neglect of the clover or 

 grass, or whatever food they may be surrounded by. It is 

 probable also that the deer trample under the heather, in the 

 course of their working at it, any horn that comes in their 

 way. 



When about to calve, the hinds retire to the most lonely 

 and undisturbed places, where there is little risk of their 

 young meeting with enemies while unable to escape. For a 

 few days they appear to keep them in these safe solitudes, 

 visiting them little during the daytime ; but as soon as the 

 calves have acquired a certain degree of strength, they be- 

 come the inseparable companions of their mothers. Where 

 the hind is, there is the calf following its dam over hill and 

 dale. At first they are covered with white marks, but, 

 losing these, they are of a darkish brown, and are well 

 clothed with long hair by the approach of the winter. 

 Although not coming to full maturity for several years, the 

 growth of young deer is very rapid for the first six or eight 

 months. Did they not gather strength rather quickly in 

 proportion to their after growth, it would be impossible for 

 them to keep company with the hinds in their numerous 

 flights over mountainous and dangerous passes, impelled on- 



